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Bloomberg News

July 5, 2017, 5:35 AM EDT

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After striking deal after deal to acquire companies abroad over the last few years, China's bill is now coming due. The nation’s top corporate dealmakers, including HNA Group and Fosun International, must pay off the equivalent of at least $11.5 billion in bonds and loans by the end of 2018 — a feat now complicated by government efforts to rein in their aggressive rush overseas. Debt markets that were eager to dish out funds have helped fuel more than $310 billion of overseas acquisitions by Chinese companies since the start of 2016. Borrowers are now waking up to a hangover.

The U.S. confirmed a rocket launched by North Korea on July 4 was an intercontinental ballistic missile, calling the event a "new escalation of the threat" to the U.S. and its allies that will be brought before the United Nations Security Council. How will the U.S. and its allies in North Asia handle this escalating situation? Here are their options.

Xiaomi is going old school to reclaim the smartphone crown in China. The company pioneered an online flash-sales model that lifted it to dizzying heights and made it Asia’s most valuable startup, but it’s since fallen on hard times. Now it’s counting on old-fashioned retail to make a comeback, and that’s proving a much stiffer challenge.

Two decades after the Asian crisis and these markets are still down. Three stock markets have never returned to the peaks they achieved in the years before the Asian financial crisis triggered a region-wide sell-off two decades ago — Japan, Thailand and Taiwan.

Hong Kong hedge fund thanks the short sellers. Jim Fong, portfolio manager at hedge fund Quam Asset, has something to say to the short sellers who have become increasingly active in Hong Kong’s markets: thank you.

War or recession might be needed to shake volatility from its yearlong slumber, Goldman Sachs says. That’s generally been the case for the 14 similar low volatility "regimes" since 1928, at least in equity markets. Goldman says low volatility isn’t unusual and tends to stem from a favorable macroeconomic backdrop with strong growth but anchored inflation and rates.

A bond buyer with a record appetite. A single purchaser snapped up all A$800 million ($609 million) of Australian government bonds sold Wednesday, the largest ever amount bought by one bidder at auctions that date back to 1982. The sale came after government bonds had their strongest one-day rally in six weeks on Tuesday.

The Lee family feud. Singapore is a small but wealthy Southeast Asian island state with a reputation for order and control. So imagine the dismay when its most famous family gets involved in a very public feud — on Facebook. Here's everything you need to know about the spat between Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his two younger siblings.